Orlando music blog & zine

Tag: Karina Curto

With their 2012 debut album, Daily Whatever, Wet Nurse became a staple in the Orlando music community. The sweet melodies of the Chaplin twins infected me with some poppy punky virus that forced my body to do the strangest of gyrations. I was hooked. This Friday (9/25), the band is releasing their sophomore album, the equally lax titled, So It Goes. And here’s something you should have expected … Wet Nurse is still fucking good. In celebration of what could easily be the Wet Nurse’s breakout album, I got to talk to one of my favorite local bands about their music. And it was amazingQ Our excellent photographer, Karina Curto, directed a photoshoot with the girls that involved doughnuts. Enjoy.

The Vinyl Warhol: So, Wet Nurse … We got some mimosas, some beer.

Vanessa Brewster: Doughnuts!

TVW: Doughnuts. Mimosas. It’s been a wild ride so far. Like, I feel like I know you guys so well after the last twenty-five minutes or so. But how did you guys all get together? [To the twins] how did you guys meet?

Nina Chaplin: Well … It was about 26 years ago. And we were suckin’ each other’s thumbs in the sonogram.

[laughs]

Susanna Chaplin: She popped out and I followed. It was like, “Oh shit, there’s two of us.”

TVW: Was music something, early on, that you guys were into? Was someone copying someone else?

NC: Well, we both like to sing. That started from an early age. We’d sing together. And it wasn’t until we were like 12 or 13; we were like, “Let’s start a band!”

photo by Karina Curto

TVW: What was your first band called?

NC: We didn’t have a name. Did we have a name? We didn’t have a name. We didn’t really practice. We had like two songs.

TVW: That sounds like every band I’ve been in. So Baile, how did you get into the band? I remember, I went to a Wet Nurse show and I was like, “Who is this fourth person?”

Baile Yeager: Nina and I were in a band a while ago called Tit Sweat … One night we were at Wally’s, and Suzie brought it up. She was like, “We heard you guys playing and I think we need another guitar player.”

SC: Yeah, we were always playing around with the idea of another guitar player. [Nina] would go into solo and [the song] would sound flat. It was missing something, an extra balance. We obviously wanted it to be a girl to keep the dynamic.

TVW: Going from Daily Whatever to So It Goes was the recording process different? I imagine it was all pretty new at first.

NC: We did our EP before the first one. We just recorded that in our house. When we gathered more songs, we went into the studio and knocked it out in like … two days, maybe three.

Nina Chaplin | photo by Karina Curto

Baile Yeager | photo by Karina Curto

Susana Chaplin | photo by Karina Curto

Vanessa Brewster | photo by Karina Curto

TVW: Where was Daily Whatever recorded?

NC: At this radio station in Tampa, called WNMF … We did a few live tracks for this guy, Allister. He opened it up after hours and we could stay as long as we wanted to.

TVW: Going in for the second one, was it easier?

NC: It was still a lot of work.

VB: It was a little easier because he knew our process already.

BY: [Allister] is the best. He’s patient. Didn’t rush us and lets us take smoke breaks whenever we wanted.

TVW: Just so you know, I have Daily Whatever on vinyl and it’s so fucking good; I listen to it all the time. So, I was pretty scared going into [So It Goes] that it wasn’t going to be as good.

SC: Yeah, we were also scared.

TVW: But I’ve noticed that it’s a little more straightforward. It’s not as pop-y. The music seems to be going for a little more of that punk edge. Was [the addition of] Baile also an influence on that shift?

NC: It definitely changed the dynamic, gave us more room to explore. Maybe a little more mature sound rather than just silly pop punk.

SC: We definitely have some weird, more 90’s influences on this one.

VB: That’s more from like touring and being around different music.

NC: We generally get the same response: “Wow that’s good.”

[laughs]

photo by Karina Curto

photo by Karina Curto

photo by Karina Curto

TVW: I wanted to talk about “Belly Hurts” for a second. Because I think that’s accidentally become your calling card of sorts. I wanted to ask you how you came up with that song. It really sounds like one of those songs that came out of thin air.

NC: Actually, that song is a funny story. Me and [Susanna] wrote that a long time ago, before we started the band. It was just this funny, silly thing. Just singing stupid songs like, “Oh, why would your belly hurt?” Just like, “Oh, I ate crappy food” or sometimes when you’re hungover or didn’t get enough sleep or like, really missing a loved one. Anxious or something. We wrote that little part and never introduced it to the band. It was actually Baile.

BY: I heard them playing it and that harmony. I heard that first harmony and I was like, “Um … excuse me.” [laughs] “What the fuck!?”

VB: It was just that first part for a long time.

BY: I was just like, “That needs to be a fucking song.”

SC: So we worked on it a little bit and it ended up being one of the biggest hits of our career.

VB: It’s pretty cool that people sing it and it’s not even out.

TVW: And when I see you playing with bands like False Punk, whose hooks are that they don’t have any hooks, you guys play “Belly Hurts” and everyone is singing it, all these punks who were just throwing themselves at each other.

VB: We started though, playing hardcore shows … I like those shows.

TVW: When did you guys start?

NC: 2010. We had a different drummer around that time, our roommate Jordan. He started because we just wanted to have fun and play shows with our friends. And then we played like two or three shows, and he skipped town for like, months. We had shows and were like, “Shit!” So, we held auditions and [Vanessa] came over and got really stoned. We gave her the songs; we had like four or five songs. And she killed it!

VB: I thought I bombed it because I was so stoney bologna.

photo by Karina Curto

photo by Karina Curto

TVW: Are you guys the kind of those bands that writes 100 songs and picks the best 12 for the records?

VB: No. We wrote exactly how many are on the record. We’re not like prolific …

NC: JESUS!

SC: What?!

VB: Oh!

BY: It’s a really big bug. It’s a palmetto.

NC: We don’t like bugs!

BY: Wet Nurse does not like bugs.

SC: We hate them!

TVW: Do we want to move?

NC: It’s a loud motherfucker!

TVW: Should I kill it? Is that okay?

BY: Use your notes.

[whack!]

SC: He’s in the fanny [pack]!

NC: No! Get out of my fanny. He gone … oh no, he back.

[whack! whack! whack!] the bug is dead.

TVW: OK. I don’t fuck with bugs either. That’s going to be fun to listen back on.

VB: Whack! Whack!

NC: Loud motherfucker!

VB: What were we talking about?

TVW: We were talking about music, I think.

[laughs]

See Wet Nurse when they destroy to whatever dumb town you live in! Tour dates here!

Last Thursday was another milestone for this strange art collective. Some of Orlando’s brightest creatives shared their art at Wills Pub. Zines were snatched up and devoured, and a variety of music and spoken word filled the crowd’s ears. Thanks to everyone who performed and tabled. We’ll see you again soon. Enjoy.